I lift my face and Eros looks down and, gods, we’re so close. This is a mistake. At any moment, I’ll pull away and put a respectable amount of distance between us and it will be like this strange little interlude never happened. At…any…moment…
A bright flash sears my eyes. I jerk away from Eros and blink rapidly. Oh no. Oh no, no, no, no. This can’t be happening.
Except it is happening. My vision clears slowly, and any hope I have of pretending some light bulb shattered at random goes up in smoke. A short white man with bright ginger hair and a camera in his hands stands a few feet away. He grins at us. “I knew I saw you get in the elevator together. Psyche, care to comment about what you’re doing sneaking away from Zeus’s party to get alone time with Eros Ambrosia?”
Eros takes a menacing step toward the photographer, but I grab his arm and fight for a smile. “Just a friendly little chat.”
The man doesn’t miss a beat. “Is that why Eros’s shirt is buttoned up incorrectly? And you looked like you were about to kiss in this picture?” He’s gone before I can come up with a lie that might make sense.
“We’re fucked,” I breathe.
Eros curses far more creatively than I have. “That about sums it up.”
I know how this goes. Before the end of the night, pictures of me and Eros will be plastered across the gossip sites, and people will start theorizing about our forbidden romance. I can see the headlines now.
Star-crossed lovers! What will Demeter and Aphrodite think of their children’s secret relationship?
Forget stroking out in rage. My mother is going to kill me.
3
Eros
Two weeks later
“Bring me her heart.”
“My chest is healed up just fine. Thanks for asking.” I don’t look up from my phone as my mother paces from one side of the room to the other, her skirt swishing about her legs. Knowing her, she chose her clothing today to maximize her dramatic flouncing.
She’s nothing if not a showwoman.
The phone isn’t the distraction I’d like it to be. In the two weeks since the party, the speculation and gossip about me and Psyche Dimitriou hasn’t died down. If anything, our refusal to make a public comment about it has only fanned the flames. There’s nothing Olympus loves more than a good story, and the children of two public enemies hooking up is nothing if not a good story. The truth doesn’t matter when there’s a compelling lie to be told.
Not to mention the photographer got a stellar shot.
In the picture, we’re standing so close, nearly in an embrace, and she’s looking up at me in question. And me? The look on my face can only be described as hungry. I wouldn’t have done something as foolish as to kiss Psyche in that hallway, but no one looking at our image will believe it.
“Stop playing with your phone and look at me.” My mother spins on her tall heel and glares down at me. She’s fifty, and though she’d skin me alive for saying as much, no wrinkles or gray hair betray her. She spends a fortune to keep her skin smooth and her hair a perfect icy blond. Not to mention the countless hours with her personal trainer to accomplish a body twenty-year-olds would kill for. All in the name of her title, Aphrodite. When one has the role of the matchmaker of Olympus—the peddler of love—one must meet certain expectations.
“Eros, put down that godsdamned phone and listen to me.”
“I’m listening.” My bored tone betrays my waning patience, but I’m already tired of this conversation. We’ve had some variation of it about a dozen times in the last two weeks. “I already told you what really happened.”
“No one cares what really happened.” She’s almost screeching now, her carefully curated smoky tones going high and sharp. “They are dragging your name through the mud by attaching it to that upstart’s daughter.”
I don’t point out that the title Aphrodite has no more legacy than Demeter’s. The only titles in Olympus that pass from parent to child are Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon. The rest of the Thirteen come to them as adults, in ways both aboveboard and clandestine. My mother can’t stand the fact that she was appointed by the last Aphrodite, while Demeter was chosen through a citywide election.
The people chose Demeter, and she’s never let my mother forget it.
“It won’t be long before the next scandal hits. Just be patient.”
“You don’t tell me what to do, Son. I give the orders, and you obey.” She stops in front of me and glares. “This is your mess. If you’d done the last job properly, you wouldn’t have been photographed with that girl.”
“Mother.” I don’t know why I’m arguing. Once my mother goes on a rampage, it’s all but impossible to divert her. It’s one of the reasons people step so carefully around her. Even I have to step carefully around her. She might present our relationship to the public as adoring mother and loyal son, but the truth is far less appealing. I am Aphrodite’s knife. She tells me where to go, what revenge to exact, and I follow along like a fucked-up toy soldier. My input is never asked for and sure as fuck never heeded. I told her that we needed to wait to deal with Polyphonte instead of rushing into things the night of that party, but Aphrodite pushed the subject.